


A Sketch of the Past

by Bina_Bee



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: I promise it has a happy ending!, Just tons of Fluff, Keith can draw, M/M, Mentions of Rape, Mentions of Suicide, Slow Burn, and a writer, and grizzled, and is an adorable little munchkin, but nothing graphic, kind of?, lance is bigger, literally nothing to do with cannon, timetravel au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-29
Updated: 2018-10-29
Packaged: 2019-08-09 10:38:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16448318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bina_Bee/pseuds/Bina_Bee
Summary: Lance returns to his hometown after many years, finally ready to confront the shadows of his past. His return doesn't go quite as expected, however, when he finds a mysterious phone that is able to make calls through time. Will his connection to the boy on the other end of the line help to heal him or only resurface old scars?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Whelp... Here goes. This is my first fic, so please be gentle! Let me know what you guys think down in the comments! I'd love to hear from you!
> 
> I know the first chapter is a little short, but they should be longer after this!

“I know, mamá,” Lance said as he worked the latch on the unfamiliar gate. He shifted the weight of the cardboard box he was carrying into a better position on his hip and squeezed the phone tighter between his head and shoulder so it wouldn’t fall to the ground as he tried to get the rusted latch to budge. “I’m not a kid anymore. I shave. I pay taxes. I can make a decent bowl of cereal. I’ll be fine. Besides, Auntie Lura is less than a ten minute drive away, right? If I really get into trouble, I can go to her for help.”

There was a pause as the voice on the other end of the line said something, and Lance stopped fiddling with the latch to listen.

“I know,” he said, trying to make the catch in his voice not sound as obvious as it felt. He was silent for a second, then quietly added, “I love you, too,” before hanging up the phone with his free hand and shoving it into the pocket of his jeans.

Lance sighed and leaned his forehead against the rough wood of the gate, willing the tears that were welling in his eyes to either dry up or else spill out. Instead they just sat there, stinging his eyes and making it impossible to see even the slats of wood in front of him.

He stayed like that for a solid minute before taking a deep breath and shaking his head to clear away the residual sting of the salt in his eyes. He would be fine. He was almost thirty years old. The incident had happened nearly ten years ago.  _ No _ , he reminded himself,  _ Not nearly.  _ Exactly _ ten years ago. That’s why I came back to this town after so long—for closure. So the nightmares would finally stop and I could move on with my life. _

He took one more deep breath, willing the strength back into his limbs. He couldn’t afford to sit there moping about; he had a moving van full of boxes that needed to be carried into the small house before dark, and he still hadn’t even gotten the gate open yet.  _ Speaking of which… _

He eyed the rusted latch again, then put his load on the grassy walkway, took a step back, and rammed his shoulder into the wood. Pain shot through his arm, but the blow seemed to have shaken the gate enough that the latch was loosened and he was able to open it.

With a feeling of accomplishment at this small victory, Lance pushed the gate open, grabbed the large box from the ground, and started towards the door of the old house.

“32 East Willow Lane,” he quietly said to himself, taking in the house’s exterior. “Welcome home, Lance.”


	2. Chapter 2

Lance put down the last of the boxes from the van, stretched, and heaved a sigh. It had been a long day of hard labor—cleaning up the dust and bringing in and unpacking his belongings—but it felt good to finally be done. Now all that was left to do was carry some of the packages he wouldn’t be needing for a while up to the attic and bring the moving van back to the rental agency in the next town over.

_If I don’t want to pay for an extra day, I’ll have to take the van back before nine o’clock tomorrow morning,_ he mused. _Bu_ _t it might be worth getting up early if it means I won’t have to run over there still tonight…_

He was interrupted from his thoughts by a knock coming from the front door. As he approached, he saw a familiar silhouette through the frosted glass window and smiled.

“Auntie Lura,” he exclaimed as he opened the door to let the old woman inside. “I was wondering when you’d show up.”

“Trying to keep me away from my own house?” she asked with a twinkle in her eye, drawing him into a tight hug. “And after I let you stay here from the good of my heart, too? The youths of today, I tell you. Ungrateful, if you ask me.”

She released him from the hug and patted him lightly on the cheek.

“I missed you, too, Auntie Lura,” Lance laughed.

She smiled at him before turning to take in Lance’s freshly unpacked belongings that mingled with the house’s original furniture in its small living room.

“How’s this old place treating you, Lance?” she asked. “It’s a little small, but I figured it’d be perfect for a bachelor like you.”

She gave him a look, and Lance blushed.

“It’s perfect. Thanks for letting me stay here while I’m working on my book; I think this atmosphere is just what I needed to get over this slump I’ve been in. But are you sure you won’t let me pay rent for staying here? Even if it’s just a little, I could—”

She waved him off. “This old place has been empty for years. After I moved out back before you were born, I used to rent it out to local families who were on hard times, but since the last family left it’s just been sitting here gathering dust. I used to come in every week to clean it, but I’m not as young as I used to be, and I haven’t been in at all since my back gave out over the summer. I’m just glad this old place is finally getting some use.”

“Well, I’m glad that I could be the one to do it,” Lance said. “I promise I’ll take good care of it in your stead, Auntie Lura.”

“There you go again, calling me Auntie. You know I’m not your real aunt. I’ll never know why your mother had you call me that in the first place.”

He laughed. “Sorry, Allura. Force of habit.”

Even though she claimed to hate it, Lance knew that Allura secretly loved the nickname he and his mother had given her back when he was a kid. Since Lance’s dad left, his mom had been left to raise Lance by herself, and she had had to work two jobs and a part-time to provide for them. Auntie Lura had often helped the two out, cooking meals for them or watching Lance when his mother was at work. It had felt like she really was part of the family.

And he knew that they weren’t the only family she had helped like that. Allura was well-known and loved throughout the neighborhood; anytime a family had come on hard times—which they all did, at some point or another—Allura was there with one of her famous fruitcakes and a smile to help them out. Though she had no family of her own anymore, she had made herself a part of every family in that small community.

They talked for a while longer before Allura reluctantly told Lance that she had to get going; she had only stopped by to say hi on her way to the store. Lance thanked her again and received another hug and a fruitcake she had brought with her in return. He waved her off as she left, and she made him promise that he’d call her if he ever needed anything. He promised and, with one last wave, headed back inside and closed the door.

He smiled a little to himself, just knowing that people like Allura lived in the world.

Turning towards the last few boxes that needed to be carried up to the attic, Lance sighed a little at the work that still needed to be done. What he really wanted was to take a nice, hot shower before heading to bed, but he had promised himself that he would finish all the work today so he would be free to start writing the next day. He took a deep breath, grabbed the first box, and turned towards the narrow wooden stairs that led to the attic.

After Lance had finished hauling the boxes up the stairs, he took a moment to look around the small, dark attic. For as old as the house was, it was remarkably clean and well-kept. He could imagine Auntie Lura lovingly maintaining the house she had grown up in up until her back had given out. There were a few old chests and boxes and some unused furniture draped with white cloth sitting about. Everything was covered in a thin layer of dust. With the faint evening light streaming in through the single round window revealing small particles drifting through the air, the room looked to Lance like a set from an old film.

Trailing his hand along the tops of the chests and covered sofas as he walked among them and reveling in the path his fingers left in the dust, Lance marveled at the antiquity of it all. He had no use for his own lousy memories, but the pure feelings of nostalgia for a time long before his own that he felt in the musty atmosphere of that attic filled him with delight. He had used to love old things… When had that stopped?

Lance let the question fall from his mind unanswered, focusing instead on the light layer of dust that coated the furniture around him as he walked. He paused in front of a small, dark chest that seemed to be minding its own business in the corner of the room farthest from the soft glow of light that the window permitted to enter. There was a small, antique key tied to a pink silk ribbon sticking out of the latch. He was struck by the sudden urge to open the chest, to intrude on the private memories of its previous owner and learn all its secrets. His hand went to the latch, but he hesitated. There was something that seemed so intimate—so _wrong_ —about snooping through someone else’s belongings like that. Despite his reluctance, though, his curiosity drew his hand to the key like a magnet. _Besides_ , he told himself, _it’s probably just some old tablecloths that Auntie Lura needed to store or something…_

Justifications aside, Lance knew that it was curiosity that made him open the chest, plain and simple. He grabbed the key and turned. There was a soft click from some internal mechanism as the chest was unlocked. He reached up and lifted the heavy wooden lid of the trunk.

Rather than old tablecloths as he had expected, however, the chest was filled with slightly yellowing paper of all shapes and sizes—from lined paper to small, cut scraps and old white restaurant napkins. Each one was covered with drawings. Some were proper sketches with shading and technique, but others were the mere crayon ramblings of a child. Every single piece of paper was lovingly stacked and ordered, no matter the quality of the picture it possessed.

Off to the side of the stacks of paper was a leather-bound journal tucked next to an old fashioned, rotary-style phone. The phone was beautiful, all gold curves and white trimmings. It was the kind of phone that belonged in a museum, not in a dusty attic in the middle of nowhere. He brushed the ivory base lightly with his fingertips, longing to hook it up and see if it would still work.

Lance let his eyes wander from the phone to the leather journal next to it. He picked it up and flipped to a page at random. The page contained a sketch of a small, pretty blossom. It looked like some type of sunflower. The bottom of the page was dated August 3, 2004. _Almost fourteen years ago_ , he thought to himself. The handwriting was small and feminine, written in a loopy cursive. He supposed artist must have been a young girl.

He flipped to a new page and was met with a smiling portrait of Auntie Lura. He checked the date: 2005. She appeared to be several years younger in the picture, but she was unmistakable. Lance laughed lightly at the similarities. Her smile and the way she pinned back her long, white hair hadn’t changed a bit in thirteen years. Each curve of her face was lovingly rendered in perfect details. Whoever the artist of these papers was, she must have been very close with Allura. She would’ve had to have been, for Auntie Lura to have kept all these drawings of hers. Judging by the dates, Lance guessed she had been the daughter of one of the house’s previous tenants.

He traced the lines on the page, smiling at the little piece of the past he had uncovered. He wondered about the mysterious person whose past he was now peeking through this small window into. _What are you doing now?_ He wondered. _Do you stay in contact with Allura? Wherever you are now, do you still draw?_ He resolved himself to ask Auntie Lura about it next time he saw her. The writer in him was dying to find out how this particular story had ended.

Lance shut the journal and held it close to his chest, then, after a moment’s hesitation, reached down and grabbed the old rotary phone, too, before closing and locking the chest. He knew it was strange, but he felt an emotional investment in this stranger that he’d forced his way into the world of. He wasn’t sure why, but he wanted to find out more; the same feeling that had urged him to open the chest in the first place now compelled him to seek more answers about the mysterious young artist. He would bring his new treasures down with him to investigate at a later time. But it was dark now—almost too dark to navigate his way back out of the attic—and he was tired from his long day of cleaning and moving boxes. He could look for his answers another time. For now, though, it was enough for him to sink down into the covers of his new bed and go to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I made Allura into a sweet old lady. Sorry about that. Wait, no. I'm not.


	3. Chapter 3

Lance woke up in a start, breathing hard. He tried to calm his trembling limbs by curling into as tight a ball as was physically possible, hugging his legs to his chest. He tried to blink the still-flowing tears from his eyes, and buried his face into the small hollow between his knees and his torso.

 _A dream,_ he thought. _Just a dream. It isn’t real._

 _But it had been,_ some small voice in the back of his head whispered to him like a dark caress. _It’s not some fiction; it’s the reality of your past. What right do you have to pretend it never happened when all of it was your fault?_

Lance shook the voice from his head. He squeezed himself into an even tighter ball, harboring some foolish hope that he could block the voice out if he just curled tight enough that there were no holes left in his defenses for it to get through. Eventually the voice quieted, and he turned to look at the small digital clock on his nightstand, uncurling from his tight ball to do so. The too-bright crimson numbers read 12:46 a.m.; he had barely been asleep for an hour, but there was no way he was going back to sleep in the state he was in. Sighing a bit, he sat up in his bed and looked around his room blearily, still trying to ground himself firmly in reality.

He took a shaky breath and untangled himself from his blankets to stand up and stretch his muscles, which were sore from where he had been clenching them in his sleep as the nightmare had overtaken him. The old house was cold—which wasn’t unexpected in the late September chill that tended to settled around New England like a fog—and he shivered at the loss of his blankets. The cold air was like a sharp slap, though, and it helped him shake off the last dredges of sleep that still clung to him.

He stood there a moment—lost, shivering, and slowly blinking his eyes as they roamed over the room, taking in the still-unfamiliar surroundings. They landed on the leather-bound journal that he had put on his nightstand earlier. He picked it up and settled back on his bed, opening to the first page. It was dated September 2000 and had a shaky sketch of a dandelion. Under the picture was a label written in the painstaking cursive of a child, ‘ _My birthday present._ ’ The corner of his mouth quirked up in a small smile at the childish sight. Even Lance, with his limited knowledge of art, could tell that the drawing was a lot less sure and steady than the pictures that he had seen later in the book. For a minute, he felt a strange sort of pride for this girl that he had never met and knew next-to-nothing about. She had practiced so hard and come so far.

He flipped to a later page in the journal. The page was labeled 2006. It showed a landscape sketch of the small town’s Main Street; the lines were confident and dark, and it showed off years of the artist’s careful practice. The scene in the picture looked just like it did in Lance’s memory.

Looking at the page brought back recollections of a childhood spent with his mother in their small, one-bedroom house; of buying strawberry popsicles at the corner store during the heat of the summer; of racing with his friends down the same street he now saw reflected on the page; of his mother waving goodbye as he struck off for his first day of high school, head held high with pride; of clubs and sports and homework; of laughing with his friends at lunchtime as one of them threw grapes for the others to try to catch in their mouths; of a teacher asking, “Lance, could you take these worksheets to Mr. Sendak’s office?”; of shifting his load of papers as he opened the door to the office; of squinting into the darkness of the office, wondering if it would be okay to just set the paper on the desk and leave; of noticing a shadow shift in the darkness and calling out, “Mr. Sendak?”; of the soft sound of tears; of a gasp and running feet; of frantic words mimicking his frantic heartbeat; of the school counselor’s falsely soothing words doing nothing to comfort him; of worry and dread and those horrible, horrible words: “I’m so sorry, but he’s—”

Lance snapped the journal shut and tossed it aside onto the rumpled blankets of his bed, shaking and breathing heavily as the images from his nightmare—images from his past—washed over him.

 _Maybe I should stay away from the journal for a while,_ he though with half a wry smile. He had grabbed the journal to take his mind off the dream, but it had only ended up making it so much worse. Right now it would be best if he stayed away from any reminders of the past, even if the past wasn’t his own… What he really needed was to talk to someone, to hear the voice of another human being. His eyes wandered over to where the old rotary phone that he had taken down from the attic now sat on his dresser.

 _This is as good a time as any to test it out,_ he thought. If nothing else, it would help to take his mind off the images of the dream that were still clinging to the back corners of his mind.

He crossed the room to the dresser and eyed the base of the phone. He could see where wires were meant to stick out of the back, but there were no wires present; there was no way to plug it in.

 _So much for that_ , he thought.

The old phone was broken, then. That must be why it was locked away in that old trunk. Its beauty was no good to anyone if it didn’t work.

He reached out and stroked the ivory longingly, wondering if there was a shop in town where he could bring it to have it fixed. His fingers curled around the handset, and he brought it up to his ear, imagining the dull drone of a dial tone buzzing back at him.

Except it wasn’t his imagination; there really was a buzz coming from the receiver.

 _So it does work, then_ , he thought. _But… How?_

He glanced quickly behind the phone again to make sure that he hadn’t missed some wires somewhere after all, but no. There were none.

His mind whirled through a million possibilities of how it was that, despite not being plugged in, this antique phone was still able to function. The most plausible explanation he could come up with was that it was some modern recreation that ran on batteries and was only styled to look like an antique phone. The theory made sense, but it didn’t feel quite right. The phone was too weighty, too carefully-made to be anything but genuine. And, besides, Auntie Lura wasn’t the type to keep cheap imitations around. So it was real, then. And it was somehow able to turn on even without wires.

 _But does it really work, though?_ He wondered. _I guess there’s only one way to find out._

Lance stared down at the dial, wondering who he could call. He supposed he could call his mother, but calling her at one in the morning would only worry her, and she already dealt with so much because of him as it was… But he didn’t really know anyone else he _could_ call. He hadn’t talked to anyone outside of the bare minimum he needed to for work since graduation. In fact, that’s one of the reasons why he had started working as a writer: so he wouldn’t have to deal with socializing with anyone. Not that there was anyone who would want to talk to him, anyways…

But wallowing in his self-inflicted isolation wouldn’t solve his problem. Who could he call at one in the morning? A sudden flash of a memory came to him, of the first time his friends Katie and Hunk had stayed the night at his house back in middle school. They had argued for a solid hour over what year Marty McFly traveled to in _Back to the Future II_ , made a bet on who was right, and had marathoned all three movies to find out. Of course Lance had lost—no one could beat Katie when it came to old Sci-Fi movie trivia. For losing the bet, Katie had dared Lance to make a prank call, even though it was already three in the morning by the time they had finished the marathon. Reluctantly, Lance had obeyed, and had ended up getting yelled at by some old man with a strong Southern accent that he had woken up with his call. Although he had been terrified at the time, the memory now made him smile. It was a good memory. A harmless memory.

 _Alright_ , he thought, _let’s do this. I could do with some fun right about now._

His hand went to the disk, but he paused, unsure of what number to dial. He thought back to the old rotary phone his abuelos had had in their house. It had been similar in function but certainly less ornate than the one he was using now. Theirs had just been a plain black box with a dial and handset. It was nothing compared to the white-and-gold curved beauty that was sitting on his dresser. No, his abuelos’ phone had favored function over form. For them, it hadn’t been a lovely treasure like Lance suspected this one had been for its previous owner. Theirs had been a tool, and they used it as such.

He had always been bad at remembering phone numbers, so his grandfather had taught him a trick for the times he stayed with them: if you dial 1166—an easy number for his young mind to remember—then the phone will automatically call the last number that was dialed. Since his abuelos, too, had really only ever called his mother, he was able to use this trick to call his mom anytime he needed during the weekends he stayed with his abuelos. Thinking back to this old, familiar trick, Lance couldn’t help but wonder about his phone’s previous owner and who the last person she had called with it was…

Almost before he realized what he was doing, Lance had spun the dial to the familiar numbers and was waiting with bated breath as the first ring resonated through the air. It was almost deafening in the still silence of the old house. Lance began to rethink his brilliant plan. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to call a total stranger in the middle of the night on some phone that could somehow magically work without electricity. Sure, it would be nice to hear another person’s voice, but he could make it through the night without it. He’d done it before. So many, many times before.

The second ring blared, and Lance was startled from his thoughts, almost dropping the handset. At the third ring, he tightened his grip and resolved himself; he had started the call, so he would see it through to the end—even if no one picked up, which seemed more and more likely by the second. The fourth ring was interrupted by a small click, and then silence.

 _Of course_ , Lance thought with a sigh. _Of course they hung up. Who in their right mind would answer a phone call in the middle of the night?_

Lance resigned himself to another night sitting alone, with only his thoughts for company. He started to lower the handset back towards the base, but was stopped by a small sound from the other end of the line. He quickly brought the receiver back up to his ear.

“Hello..?” A tired voice, rough with sleep called out. A small voice. The voice of a child.

“Hi… No! I mean, uh, hello,” Lance stuttered into the phone, unsure of exactly what to say. “Um… Hi?”

“Who is this?” The voice asked, and Lance could tell it belonged to a young boy, a kid whose voice hadn’t yet deepened from puberty.

“I—,” Lance began.

“How did you get my phone number?”

“I’m not sure,” Lance began, unsure of how—or even _if_ —he should explain why he called. Finally, after a too-long pause, he finished lamely, “I guess I just dialed the wrong number?”

“But why are you calling so late? It’s the middle of the night.”

“I-I’m sorry,” Lance stammered. The half-suppressed emotions from his nightmare were trickling back in as doubt ate at the temporary wall he had built in his mind. He felt a sting as traitorous tears began to well up in his eyes, originating from somewhere deep within his aching chest. Why had he thought this call would be a good idea? “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called. It was a mistake.”

There was a brief pause as the boy sat silent on the other end of the line. For a second, Lance thought he had hung up. Then,

“Are you okay?” he heard the boy ask. “You sound like you’re crying.”

“No, I’m just—,” Lance said quickly, roughly wiping at the tears and silently cursing himself for crying in front of a little kid.

“I’m sorry,” The kid said softly. “I didn’t mean to make you cry. It’s okay that you called me. Really. I don’t mind.”

“No, I’m the one who’s sorry,” Lance said with a sigh. Why was this kid so much more mature than he was? “I shouldn’t have called you in the middle of the night…. Or at all, for that matter.”

“It’s okay,” the boy repeated. Then, with the kind of pointed perception that is only possessed by thieves and small children, he asked, “Did you have a nightmare?”

“I guess you could say that.”

“Even adults can have nightmares?” the boy asked in awe.

“Yeah,” Lance replied with a wry smile. “Even adults can have nightmares.”

Neither of the two could think of anything to say after that, and silence fell over them. Lance mentally berated himself for deciding to make this call in the first place. What was he doing talking to a small child in the middle of the night? Just the thought of it was ridiculous. What had he even expected to get out of this? Lance opened his mouth to apologize to the boy and tell him to go back to sleep, but he was cut off before the words could leave his lips.

“What’s your name?” The boy asked quickly, almost as if he was afraid he’d be reprimanded for the question.

Lance spared a soft chuckled for the innocent curiosity of childhood before responding.

“Lance,” he said. “My name is Lance.”

“Lance…” the boy repeated softly, contemplating the feeling of the word on his lips.

Lance couldn’t help but smile again. The little boy’s naivety reminded him of his own childhood, of the endless questions and the wide-eyed wonder at every answer.

Before he could stop himself, Lance found himself asking, “What’s yours?” in response.

“You can call me Red,” the boy answered back brightly, any sleep that might have remained in his voice now banished by his childish excitement at the prospect of a new friend. Lance wasn’t sure why, but he found the boy’s excitement to be contagious. He felt his own negative emotions draining from him. He laughed.

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Mister Red.”

Red giggled at being addressed like a grown-up, then gasped a little, as if he had just remembered something important.

“Lance!” he whisper-shouted into the phone. “Do you want to know a secret?!”

“What is it?”

“Today was my birthday! Or, well, I guess it was yesterday now, but…”

“Was it really?”

“Uh-huh! I’m ten now.”

“Well, happy belated birthday, Red! Did your parents throw you a party with your friends? Did you get to eat cake and get lots of presents?”

“Um…,” Red started, but trailed off, his enthusiasm vanishing in an instant.

“What’s wrong? Did something happen?”

“No. Nothing,” Red said quickly. “It’s just that the kids at school don’t really talk to me very much. And my dad was away on a business trip. And my mom…”

“I’m so sorry,” Lance started, instantly regretting his earlier choice of words. “I shouldn’t have assumed—”

“No, it’s fine. Really. I’m used to it. I’ve always been alone on my birthday. But I guess I wasn’t completely alone. The lady who looks after me—Nanny—she was here, and she baked me a really yummy cake and gave me presents. She even gave me this phone so I could call her when I have nightmares. This is my first call,” Red finished proudly.

“Well, I’m honored,” Lance said with a smile, glad that Red hadn’t spent his birthday entirely by himself. “Did you get any other presents?”

“Yeah, I—,” Red began, but cut himself off with a long, loud yawn.  Lance suddenly remembered what time it was. In all the excitement, he had forgotten that it was now almost two in the morning, and Red was only ten years old.

“You should be in bed,” Lance said after Red was finished yawning, regret seeping into his voice. “I’m sorry for keeping you up so late.”

“No, it’s fine,” Red said, trying and failing to keep the sleep from his own voice. “You had a bad dream, right? A person should always talk to somebody when they have a bad dream. It keeps the nightmares away. That’s what Nanny says, anyways.”

“Well, your Nanny must be very smart,” Lance said.

“She is.”

There was a soft silence for a moment, then:

“Hey, Lance…”

“Yeah?”

“If… If you want, you can call me again. My phone is in my room, and dad is never home, so you don’t have to worry about anyone else answering it. Just… If you have another nightmare, then you can call me. No matter what time it is. I won’t mind. Promise.”

It suddenly struck Lance just how lonely this little boy must be. He didn’t seem to have any friends his own age, and the only parent he had was perfectly fine with missing his kid’s birthday for a business trip. No wonder Red was so willing to talk to a stranger on the phone. He felt his heart break a little for this small, lonely kid on the other end of the telephone line.

“Yeah, okay, Red,” he said. “I promise. I’ll definitely call you next time I have a nightmare. Now get some sleep, kiddo.”

“’Kay…,” Red said with another yawn. “Goodnight, Lance.”

“Goodnight,” Lance said. He moved to hang up the phone, then stopped himself and brought the handset back up to his mouth.

“Oh, and, Red,” he said quietly.

“Yeah,” came the half-asleep response.

“Thank you.”

Lance almost whispered the last line into the phone. There was no response, and he guessed that Red had already fallen asleep. Good. He hoped the kid got some rest and wouldn’t be too tired at school tomorrow because of him.

He softly put the handset back onto its base, lost in thoughts of this strange boy who had come into his life so suddenly. They had talked for such a brief time, and yet Lance felt closer to him than he did to most of his friends his own age—even the ones that he had known for years. There was just something about the boy’s soft, curious personality that brought a smile to his lips. The kid was adorable, plain-and-simple.

And better yet, Lance found that after the phone call with Red, his breathing had calmed down, and his heart was no longer pounding in his chest. He felt better than he had in months, maybe even years. The kid had somehow known exactly what to say to put him completely at ease.

A sort of sleepy peace settled over him, and he laid down on his bed and wrapped himself back up in the blankets, remembering how cold he was only after the excitement of the phone call had worn away. He yawned and curled in on himself, already starting to drift off into a peaceful sleep.

Before his eyes had closed fully, a thought occurred to him: _If that had been Red’s first phone call, then how was it that my redial had gone to that number?_

But it was late and he was tired, so Lance let the question drift away from his mind and into oblivion as sleep overcame him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you were wondering: yes, "Red" is my boi, Keef. And, yes, there is a reason I gave him a ridiculous nickname. Just hold your horses, okay? Patience yields focus and all that.


	4. Chapter 4

Lance glared at the blank white screen, willing the small wisps of thought in his head to magically transform into words and fly onto the page. It had already been eight days since he’d moved in, and his writer’s block was still as strong as ever. Frustrated, he turned off the screen and spun his swivel chair around so he was looking out the window.

The house had a large backyard that, rather than being fenced off like many of the yards he had seen in the city, faded out into the forest behind it with no clear line between the two. The trees were tall and deciduous. They were old trees. Beautiful trees. Lance could remember laughing as he ran through a different part of the same forest when he was younger, carefree and happy. When was the last time he’d actually been happy?

The echo of a carefree giggle drifted through Lance’s mind, and he thought about Red. Despite his promise, he hadn’t called the little boy even once since they had talked a week ago. It wasn’t because Lance didn’t want to talk to him, just…. What would he say? How could he face that child who seemed able to see past all of Lance’s flaws, straight into his head? He sighed and pictured the boy at home all day by himself, doing—what, exactly?

_ What does Red do for fun? _ he wondered.  _ Does he talk to his Nanny? Does he have a pet he plays with? Or a book he likes to read? Does he run wild through the forest like Lance did when he was younger? Or does he just sit by himself, staring out the window and musing on somebody else’s life? _

Lance smiled wryly. There’s no way that Red, with his childlike enthusiasm and energy, would resign himself to being locked inside all day. He probably had many secret games he liked to play with himself all over the town.

Turning from the window, Lance rubbed at his eyes, which stung from staring at the computer screen for so long. He stood from the chair and stretched, pondering what to do. It was obvious that he wouldn’t get any writing done at this rate; maybe if he shook things up a little, it would spark his creativity and give him some ideas. And what better way to shake things up than a walk through the town?

He grabbed a jacket and threw on some shoes, then started out the door in the direction of the town’s Main Street.

Though it was called Main Street, the small road was really the small town’s only street with anything of interest. Between its four bars, one restaurant, hardware store, train hobby shop, and small grocery store, it was guaranteed fun for the whole family. Provided that family only had a vague understanding of what the word “fun” meant.

Walking down the street, the view held an odd mixture of the familiar and the foreign for Lance. His childhood home lay a good twenty minutes’ drive to the North of the house he was currently residing in, so the houses on either side of the road, while built in the same style he remembered, where different than the houses in his memories. However, the old oak trees that lined the street and were just starting to shed their leaves for the winter were exactly like the ones on his old street. They made the unfamiliar walk feel homey and comfortable, like it was almost but not quite a scene from a half-remembered memory.

This strange dichotomy lent an almost dream-like quality to Lance’s surrounding, and he felt his mind begin to wander as he walked, not really paying attention as he headed towards the direction he knew the town’s center to be in. He thought of nothing in particular, rather preferring to just let his thoughts drift like the leaves as they fell from the branches. He met a few people on his walk—neighbors who were jogging or walking their dogs—and nodded to them as they passed. Nobody seemed to take any note of him, just as he took no real note of any of them.

After about a fifteen minute walk, Lance made it to Main Street. It had grown quite a bit since the last time he had been there; it was now also home to a bookstore, a video rental shop/ice cream parlor, and a coffee stand. Despite the new additions, however, the old brick buildings looked just like Lance remembered them from his childhood.

He walked inside the old train hobby shop, a store he had frequented as a kid, and was met by the jingle of a small bell over the door and the slightly musky scent of old wood and dust. The interior of the shop looked almost exactly like how Lance remembered it; it even appeared to still be selling the same products as it had over ten years ago. Lance wondered if anyone ever actually bought anything from the store or if they all just looked around and enjoyed the small model train displays as he had when he was a kid. Honestly, he wasn’t sure how they had stayed in business for so long in the small town when it was targeted towards such a niche group.

“I’ll be with you in just a minute,” he heard an old voice with just a touch of an accent call from somewhere in the depths of the store. He smiled at the familiar greeting he had heard so often in his childhood, and gazed at the small toy trains on the shelves around him as he waited for the shop owner to make his appearance.

“How can I help you?” the voice asked somewhat distractedly as its owner rounded the corner of one of the various shelves to meet Lance, fiddling with one of the small paper mache trees that were used in the train displays. Lance turned away from the display he had been examining to look the kindly old man in the eye with a smile.

“I’m just looking, thanks,” came his reply, the same reply he had said so many times all those years ago.

At the sound of his voice, the old man glanced up from the crafted tree in his hands to really look at his customer. Lance could pinpoint the exact moment when the realization hit him, and from one second to the next, Lance found himself trapped inside a tight, choking hug that seemed to crush all the air from his lungs. He struggled to adjust his arms and did his best to awkwardly pat the man on the back in acceptance of the embrace.

“Lance!” he cried, loosening his grip and holding him at arm’s-length so he could examine his face. “Look at you! You’re all grown-up. What are you doing back here? It’s been a good ten years since I last saw that mug of yours. What have you been up to?”

Lance laughed. “Hello, Mr. Smythe. It’s good to see you, too.”

“Just call me Coran, please. You’re not a kid anymore. It makes me feel like my Pap Pap being called ‘Mr.’ like that. Though, I do admit I’m not quite as young as I used to be!” He gave a hearty chuckle. “But what are you doing back here, Lance? Last time I saw you, you were ten years younger and three inches shorter. I thought that we wouldn’t ever be seeing you around here, not after what happened to that poor boy.”

Lance’s smile slipped from his face, and he gave a small shrug, trying hard to focus on the conversation so his mind wouldn’t be captured by the memories that began clawing at his mind at the mention of  _ that poor boy _ .

“Well, I’m back. For a while, at least,” he told the other man. “I’m here to work on my writing—oh, right, I’m a writer now; I thought the familiar setting might help get the creative juices flowing, or something like that. So… here I am.”

“Here you are,” Coran repeated back, beaming at him as proudly as if Lance was his own son. “It never sat right with me, you leaving in such a hurry back then. I always wished there was something I could have done to help. We all did. But I’m glad to see you back, Lance. I really am.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I am, too, Coran.”

They chatted a while longer before Lance told him that he had to be on his way. Coran made him promise to visit again before he left town, and he readily agreed. He gave Lance one last hug and a tin of cookies he had in the back before he sent him on his way.

After the hobby shop, Lance stopped by the hardware and grocery stores to pick up a few things he needed for the house. He caught a few stares from the other customers, but, thankfully, if anyone else recognized him, they didn’t confront him about it.

He grabbed a coffee from the coffee stand to check it out—it wasn’t the best he’d ever had, but coffee is coffee—then started his trek back home, whistling a little into the clear blue sky. The bright September chill was enough for a jacket, but not so much that you had to burrow into layers-upon-layers of winter gear. Just enough to nip you awake and make you feel alive, like each breath was taking in a lungful of potential. It was Lance’s favorite kind of weather, and he walked with a spring in his step.

When he reached his house, he unloaded the groceries he had bought in the small kitchen, then went about doing some little touch-ups to make the house feel more like his own: change a lightbulb over here, rearrange the trinkets on the shelf over there. Small things to make the house into more of a home.

After what felt like no time at all, Lance had finished all the chores he could think of and was left abruptly with nothing to do. He glanced at the clock; it was 4:39. Too early to eat dinner, but too late to really go out and do something. He sighed. It was easy to forget his worries when his hands and mind were occupied, but when he had nothing to do…

He had to think of something.

Just as it had that morning, a small giggle drifted through Lance’s head, and he thought of Red.

_ Red. Of course _ , he thought.  _ I can call Red. _

Since their last call, there had been a nagging little piece of Lance’s mind that had been berating him for not calling the boy back. He had promised Red that he would call again, and had neglected that promise for a week now. He thought of Red, sitting alone at home, waiting for Lance to call him, questioning whether his call with the strange man had just been a dream…

_ God _ , Lance thought,  _ I’m such an ass _ .

Feeling guilty, he trudged up the stairs to his room, reached for the phone, and spun the rotary dial: 1-1-6-6. Then he waited. Red picked up on the third ring.

“Hello?” he heard the familiar voice call into the phone.

“Hey, kiddo,” Lance said, trying to keep the guilt from his voice. “What’s up?”

He heard a sharp intake of breath from the other line.

“Lance?!” Red practically shouted into the phone. “You… You’re real, right? I’m not just dreaming?”

“’fraid so,” Lance replied with a small chuckle.

“No, I didn’t mean… It’s just… It was so late when you called last time, and since you never called back, I thought…”

Lance sighed. He had let the kid down. He knew he should’ve called him earlier.

“You thought you dreamt up our whole call?”

There came a small, embarrassed, “yeah,” from the receiver.

“Sorry about that, Red. I meant to call, I really did. I’ve just had a lot going on this last week, so I didn’t have time to—”

“Week?” Red asked, incredulous. “Lance, it’s been over a year since you called me.”

“A year?”

“Yeah. A year. I thought that you were just a dream. Or, if you were real, I thought that you had completely forgotten about me. My dad wouldn’t believe me about you, and Nanny wrote it off as a game I was playing. They thought I was crazy…  _ I _ thought I was crazy.” Red was quiet for a minute, then, quietly, “Lance… Why didn’t you call? I thought we made a promise… I thought we were friends.”

On hearing the sadness in the little boy’s voice, Lance could’ve slapped himself. But he put his feelings of guilt aside for the moment; something about this didn’t add up.

“You’re sure it was a year since I called you? You’re not exaggerating or playing a joke on me, right?” He began slowly.

“Of course I’m sure. Don’t tell me you don’t believe me now, either.”

“Red, please. Just listen to me for a minute. I know it sounds crazy, but I promise that, for me, that call was only a week ago.”

“Cross your heart?” Red asked, sounding unsure.

“Cross my heart.” Lance promised.

“But that doesn’t make any sense! How is it that a week for you was a year for me?”

“I’m… not sure,” Lance said hesitantly. “You’re right that it doesn’t make sense. I don’t really know what’s happening here.”

He struggled with his thoughts for a moment, trying to find a way to describe to Red what he thought was happening. An idea came to him.

“Red, have you seen  _ Back to the Future _ ?”

“Of course!”

“Well, it’s like that—or, I think it’s like that, at least. But instead of a DeLorean, it’s our phone calls that are going through time. That’s why a year for you felt like only a week for me. Does that make sense?”

“Not really…” Red replied, sounding extremely confused.

Lance laughed. “That’s okay. I don’t think we really have to understand how it’s happening. The important thing is that whatever is happening here is letting us talk to each other, right?”

“Right!”

“So do you forgive me for not calling you back for an entire year, then?” Lance asked.

“Don’t worry,” Red giggled. “After all, it was only a week, right?”

“Right.” Lance laughed in return. It felt like the only way he could cope with the absurdity of the impossible situation he found himself in was to not think too deep into what was going on and just laugh in the face of the universe for trying to make sense anyways. So he laughed. And Red laughed, too. And the two boys laughed together until tears streamed down their faces and they couldn’t remember exactly why they had started laughing in the first place.

“Alright, then, tell me, Red,” Lance said, wiping the tears from his eyes after the laughter had finally died down. “You’re eleven now, right? What have I missed in the last year?”

“I’m in sixth grade now! I’ve been working really hard to keep my grades up, and my teacher tells me that I can make the Honor Roll if I study hard!”

“Really? That’s great, Red!”

“Yeah! And, also, I have a pet cat now!”

“You do?”

“Well, he’s not really my cat… But I don’t think he’s really anybody’s cat. Nanny says he doesn’t have a home. But I see him a lot, and I pet him when I come home from school, and sometimes I’ll give him some food, even though Dad told me not to. But I think he’s really hungry because he eats the whole can of fish I put outside. Sometimes he even comes and meows at the door for me to bring him food when I forget! But I’m the one who feeds him, so that means he’s my cat now, right?” Red said in what seemed like a single breath.

Lance laughed a little. “I think so. It sure sounds like he’s your cat to me. So, what did you name him?”

There was a small, embarrassed silence, then: “…Lance.”

“Hm?”

“No, that’s his name. I named him Lance.”

Lance felt a blush rise to his cheeks. Red had named a cat after him? After a man he had talked to on the phone one time? He knew the kid didn’t really have any friends, but had Lance really left that big of an imprint on him?

“Lance? Are you still there?” came Red’s hesitant voice.

“Huh? Oh, yeah. Sorry about that. I’m still here.”

“You don’t like the name, do you? You think it’s stupid.”

“No, no!” Lance said quickly. “I love the name. I’m honored that you would name your pet cat after me.”

“Really?”

“Really, really.”

He could almost hear Red’s smile through the phone, and he couldn’t keep the smile off his own face at the thought of the beaming child. Lance wasn’t sure how the boy did it, but he was quickly beginning to realize that Red could somehow always make him smile, no matter how bad of a mood he was in.

“So,” he said after a moment of warm silence. “Tell me what else is new.”

They talked for a long while after that, just enjoying each other’s company. Red told Lance all about the games he liked to play and the books he was reading. Lance told Red that he was a writer, and offered to let the boy read his book when he finished— _ if _ he finished. Needless to say, Red was ecstatic.

They talked for hours, telling stories and making jokes. Lance even helped Red with some homework he was having troubles with. When the time finally came for them to end the call, Lance swore that he would call the boy again the very next day, and this time he intended to make good on his promise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... Here's a [spins wheel] train shop [spins wheel again] old man [spins wheel a third time] Coran for you guys. Whelp. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


	5. Chapter 5

“Three months.” Red stated.

“Well, it’s not the worst we’ve had. At least it wasn’t a full year this time,” Lance laughed. “What’s new?”

It had already been a month since Lance and Red had begun to converse regularly. Lance tried to call at least once a day, almost afraid of the time he might miss if he skipped a day or two. After that second call that had somehow traversed time so that what had been a week for Lance had been a year for Red, each of their calls had similarly jumped through time. Sometimes, it seemed to Red that only a few days had passed since their last call, but sometimes it was several months. There seemed to be no particular pattern to it, and both boys had long since given up trying to understand their strange situation; now it was just part of their routine.

Red would always begin a call by telling Lance how long it had been since their last one and what had happened to him since then. Already, the two had grown so close that they could hardly remember what their lives had been like before the calls had started. They had become fast friends, but it was more than that. Although Lance hated to admit it, he was just as lonely as Red was. Each boy found in the other a kindred spirit and a secret keeper, and they began to rely on each other as more than just acquaintances.

On more occasions than Lance would like to admit, he had woken the boy at odd hours of the night, trembling in the hold of some night terror that he had just woken from. Though he never told the boy what the dreams were about, Red never failed to calm him down, to soothe his frayed nerves and send him back into a deep, peaceful sleep. Lance knew that his reliance on the younger boy was unusual to say the least, and he felt at times that he was burdening Red too much with his problems. But Red never seemed to mind, and it was hard to overlook that in the last month, Lance had slept better than he had in the last ten years combined.

He loved watching the kid grow up from afar, hearing tales about his classmates and “Cat Lance,” as the two boys affectionately referred to Red’s so-called pet. It wasn’t long before Lance was able to remember the names of several of the kids in Red’s class. He was able to laugh along with Red at tales of Nick, the class clown, as he spent an entire day reading his textbooks and writing upside down or returned from a bathroom break dripping wet, only to announce that he had dunked his head in the toilet and given himself a swirly.

After the boys had finished laughing at one of the particularly ridiculous stories, Lance had asked Red:

“You have so much fun telling me about these kids, why don’t you try talking to them? Who knows, you might end up becoming friends.”

Red was silent for a while before responding: “I don’t think so… I’m not funny or smart or good at sports or anything. Who’d want to be my friend?”

“That’s not true at all, Red! I can’t speak for how good you are at sports, but you’re incredibly funny—and smart! Those kids would be lucky to get to talk to you. Besides,” Lance smiled, “ _ I’m _ your friend.”

“You are? Really?”

“Of course, kiddo. Who could resist being friends with someone who names a cat after them?”

Red had snorted out a laugh, before changing the topic to some story about Cat Lance and his never-ending quest to catch the hummingbird that liked to fly around outside Red’s window. Lance considered steering the conversation back to Red’s classmates, but he thought better of it. Red obviously didn’t want to talk about it, so Lance wouldn’t make him. He couldn’t force the kid to have friends if he didn’t want them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's another short one, but given that I'm uploading every chapter at the same time, you can hardly complain about the wait or anything!


	6. Chapter 6

Three days after that conversation for Lance—and six months for Red—Lance discovered another facet to the boy. They had been conversing for well over an hour, when Lance decided to bring up something that he’d been wondering about.

“Hey, Red?”

“Hmm?”

“What’s that noise that I sometimes hear in the background on your end?”

“What noise?”

“It’s almost like a scratching,” Lance said, pondering over the strange sound. “I thought it might’ve been Cat Lance at first, but I don’t think so… It’s too irregular. And too fast. I don’t think a cat could scratch that quickly…”

Red burst out laughing and the scratching noise stopped.

“There, see? It’s gone.”

“You mean this?” Red asked, and the scratching started back up again.

“Yes! That. What is it?”

“That’s not a cat, Lance! It’s just my pencil,” Red managed to get out before laughter overcame him again.

Lance blushed at his own stupidity.  _ Of course _ it had been a pencil. A cat? Seriously? How would a cat even make noises like that?

“That makes more sense,” he said, laughing through his embarrassment. “But what are you writing?”

“Not writing,” Red said, his laughter finally dying down. “Drawing.”

“You can draw?”

“Yeah! Well… Not very good…. But I’m working on it. Nanny got me a sketchbook for my birthday a couple years ago. She said I’ll never get better unless I practice, so I’ve tried to draw something almost every day.”

Lance nodded to himself. “It’s the same with writing. You need to keep writing in order to become a better writer. Even if you think your writing’s terrible at first, you have to keep going or it won’t improve.”

“Yeah,” Red said with a giggle. “I was really bad at first, but I think I’m starting to get better.”

“What are you drawing?”

“A Black-Eyed Susan.”

“Come again?”

Red snorted. “It’s a type of flower, Lance. It looks sorta like a smaller version of a sunflower.”

“Oh,” Lance replied, feeling embarrassment once again begin to creep over his face in red patches. “Right. I knew that.”

“Suuuure you did.”

Red began to lecture him on the importance of knowing the names of at least the most common wildflowers in the area, but Lance couldn’t seem to focus on the words. There was something about what Red had said that was tugging at his memory.

_ A picture of a sunflower… It almost reminds me of— _

“Hold on a second, Red,” Lance interrupted the boy’s speech. He put the handset down on his dresser and darted across the room, eyes searching.

Finally he found what he had been looking for. The small, leather-bound sketchbook was lying forgotten in the drawer of Lance’s nightstand. He hadn’t touched it since that first night, but now he snatched up the book and hurriedly flipped through the pages until he found the one he wanted.

It was the first sketch he had seen in the book, back when he had picked it up in the attic all those months ago, the small depiction of what Lance had thought at the time was a sunflower. He picked the handset back up.

“Sorry, Red. You still there?”

“Yeah. I’m still here.” Lance could tell from his voice that Red was pouting at being interrupted earlier, and he fought to keep a smile from his face.

“Tell me something, Red,” Lance said, excitement building up inside. “What’s the date for you?”

“The date? Um… I think it’s August… fourth, maybe? Why?”

“And the year?” Lance prompted.

“2004.”

A laugh exploded from Lance’s mouth, and he soon found that he was laughing so much that it was hard to breath.

_ They match, _ he thought.  _ The dates match! That means that the mystery girl who drew the sketches in this journal… the girl who owned this phone… was Red all along. That’s the connection. That’s why I’m able to call Red like this… It’s the same phone! _

“Let me guess,” Lance managed through his laughter. “Your Nanny’s name—is it Allura?”

“Yeah, but,” Red sounded concerned. “Lance, how’d you know?”

“Hey, Red,” Lance began, still laughing, “Has anyone ever told you that you have really feminine handwriting?”

“I… Wait. What?”

“The journal.” Lance explained. “I have your journal. The one you’re drawing in right now.”

“What? How?!”

“I found it locked away in some chest up in the attic, covered in dust.”

“But…”

“Don’t you understand? I don’t know why we never realized this before, but our calls aren’t just randomly leaping around through time. Red, your present is my past. For me, 2004 was fourteen years ago.”

Red was silent.

“Hello? Kiddo? You still there?”

“Yeah. Still here. Sorry. One second… I wanna test something out.”

The scratching noise returned for a moment, and Lance waited in silence to see what the kid was up to. Finally, Red spoke again:

“Alright, Lance. I’m done. Do me a favor and turn the page.”

Curious, Lance flipped to the next page in the journal and instantly began to laugh again.

Red had drawn a hideous—as well as hideously disproportionate—caricature of a roughly-30-looking man with ruffled hair and his tongue sticking out. There was a neat little arrow drawn next to it, labeling the figure in Red’s oddly feminine handwriting as “Lance the Stupid Head.” Lance wondered what he would have done if he had happened upon this sketch instead of the picture of the flower when he had first opened the book.

“So, I take it that my test worked? It really is my journal?”

“Yeah, I’m gonna have to say it’s probably yours. That is, unless some really ugly guy named Lance happened to piss off whatever little girl actually owned this journal… But I’m thinking that’s less likely.”

The two shared a laugh.

“Out of curiosity,” Lance asked when their laughter had died down. “You live at 32 East Willow Lane, right?”

“Uh-huh.”

“So I was right, then. That’s where I’m living right now. Allura’s an old family friend, so she’s letting me stay here for free while I work on my book. When I realized that the journal was yours, I figured you must’ve been part of the family that used to live here before me.”

“That would be me and my dad, then, I guess. But when you say we used to live there, that means we don’t anymore, right? Do you know what happened to us?”

“I’m not sure…” Lance said, thinking back to his conversation with Allura back on the first day. “Allura just said the last family had left; she never said where to.”

Red hummed, deep in thought.

“You know what this mean, though, right?” Lance asked, thinking of how he could lighten the mood.

“What?”

“You and I? We’re the same age, kiddo. Somewhere in my time, there’s a twenty-eight-year-old Red, out living his life. I bet he’s super successful and wears a suit to work!”

Red laughed.

“He’s gotta be married, too. I bet he already has seven children—with another one on the way!” Lance continued.

“And at least twelve cats!” Red supplied, happy to abandon his heavy thoughts to play along.

“Oh, no doubt of it!” Lance laughed. “I bet he owns a whole zoo!”

“And an aquarium!”

“Well, that was implied. Come on, you can do better than that,” Lance encouraged the boy. “What does he do for work?”

“He’s… a famous artist!”

“No way! His career would never take off. He’s too political with his works. I mean, have you seen his early piece entitled  _ Lance the Stupid Head _ ? He’d never get anywhere in the art field by making pieces like that! No, I bet he’s a cubical man. He spends his days punching numbers into a calculator. What do you think? Sounds like a dream come true, am I right?”

“Never!” Red laughed. “I’d kill myself before I let myself become a cubical man!”

Lance’s laughter died off, and Red stopped his own at the loss of the sound.

“Oh no, I’m so sorry Lance!” Red said quickly, thinking back over what he had said. “I was just joking. I didn’t really mean...  I wouldn’t—”

“I know,” Lance cut him off. “Sorry. I’m fine.”

A heavy silence fell between the two as each one pondered their own thoughts.

“But, ya know,” Red said after a while, breaking the silence. “That means that somewhere in my time, there’s a little baby Lance just starting to go through puberty. I bet you had to have braces when you were my age.”

Lance blushed at the thought of the unflattering wires that had plagued his adolescent mouth for years, all the way into sophomore year. He had received no end of teasing about them from Katie and his friends.

“No way. Not me. I skipped puberty. I went straight from an adorable child into the handsome stud you hear today.”

“Uh huh. Sure.”

“It’s true. I would tell you to go look me up in the yearbook, but I don’t think we went to the same school. I never knew any Red’s as a kid. You’re the first.”

“Aw, man,” Red sighed. “I was hoping I could go tease you. You must’ve been so cute back… now.”

“Yeaaah,” Lance interjected. “Better not. I’m still not sure how this whole thing works, but I’d rather not have you Back-to-the-Future me out of existence just because you want to bully my younger self about my acme.”

“So you had acme, then?”

“Absolutely not.”

They talked for a while longer, but they had to hang up not long after. Red still had “mountains of Algebra” to do, and Lance wanted to stop by the grocery store before it was fully dark outside. They bade each other farewell, and ended the call.

Lance sat on his bed for a moment, reflecting on everything he’d just learned.

Red was a boy from the past—a real, living boy… Lance had known as much, but there was something different now that he held the actual proof in his hands. But Red,  _ his  _ Red, was an actual boy who played games and drew pictures and loved his cat and lived in the same house on Willow Lane Lance now did... He looked around at the small bedroom.

_ I wonder if this had been Red’s room? If this had been his dresser, his bed… _

He thought of the young boy, flashlight in hand, curled underneath the covers of the bed that Lance himself was now sitting on, staying up too late into the night to finish whatever book he was in the process of devouring. Lance felt the boy’s long-gone presence electrifying the air of the room. He placed his hand lightly on the leather cover of the now-closed journal and smiled. He hoped that the Red in his own time was happy, wherever he was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can I just say that I loved writing the Lance/Baby Keef interactions? Because I absolutely loved it! I really liked exploring a dynamic between the two if they had never had their whole rival thing and Lance was a sort of mentor/role model figure for Keith!


	7. Chapter 7

Lance huddled further into his coat as he walked, wrapping his scarf just a little tighter around his neck. The sun hadn’t set yet, but the temperature was already quickly dropping in the early November evening. He opened his mouth and let out a long puff of air, watching the moisture in his breath solidify into a fog as it left his lips.

Despite the cold weather, Lance was just thankful that it hadn’t started snowing yet; he had realized too late that he had forgotten to bring any sort of appropriate winter shoes with him during the move, and there was no store in town that sold shoes. He’d have to take the bus to the next town over to pick some up before the weather took a turn for the worse.

Ahead, he saw the bright light of the grocery store cut through the blue tinted semi-darkness that was beginning to descend, and he quickened his pace; he couldn’t wait to be inside the warmth of the store. Maybe it hadn’t been such a good idea to leave his car behind at his mother’s place when he’d moved…

Once inside the store, Lance grabbed a cart and quickly got to work on the list we had brought with him, intending to be in, out, and back home before the sun had set. He worked his way steadily down the list, throwing what he needed—and a few extra items—into the cart.

Lance navigated around a display of fresh-baked bread and turned down an aisle. He grabbed some pasta sauce off the shelf and examined the label— _Garden Tomato and Garlic_ —before giving a shrug, dropping it into the cart, and continuing on his way. He noticed a small family coming down the aisle in the opposite direction from him: a mother, a father, and their young daughter. The girl was maybe six or seven years old and was busy talking away about some game she had played at school earlier that day.

As the family came closer, Lance edged his cart as far to the right as he could so he would be out of their way. He looked down at his grocery list, pretending to be engrossed in the few items that he still needed to grab so it wouldn’t seem like he was snooping on them. They had almost passed when Lance felt a hand on his shoulder.

He turned to see the father of the family looking at him with narrowed eyes, as if trying to remember something. The little girl abruptly stopped her story in curiosity, and the mother looked on, concerned.

“I’m sorry,” the man said, removing his hand from Lance’s shoulder, “but you’re Lance, right? Lance McClain? You are, aren’t you?”

“I am.” Lance nodded. “I’m sorry, but I don’t remember your name.”

He laughed. “You wouldn’t,” he said. “I’m Katie’s older brother, Matt. I was three years ahead of you in school, so we only met a couple of times.”

“I see,” Lance responded, unsure of what else to say.

Matt turned to his daughter. “Veronica, why don’t you go pick out some doughnuts for us from the bakery. We can have them for desert later.”

The little girl nodded solemnly at her task, then turned and darted off to the bakery aisle of the store. Matt turned back to Lance.

“I heard what happened from my sister. Katie tried to contact you afterwards, but she could never get ahold of  you. It almost felt like you disappeared off the face of the Earth. We always wondered what happened to you, but you seem to be doing alright for yourself.”

“Yeah,” Lance said, just wanting the conversation to be over with. He could feel the curious eyes of Matt’s wife boring into him. “I’m doing fine. Thanks for your concern.”

“Of course. I’m glad to see that you’re doing better.” There was an awkward pause for a minute before he continued. “I’d better go check on Veronica. It was good to see you, Lance. I’ll tell Katie you said ‘hi.’”

“Yes. Thank you. Well, bye, then,” Lance said, giving a little half-wave before continuing down the aisle in a walk that was just slightly faster than what would be considered proper.  He just wanted to get the last couple items from his list so he could check out and go home. He didn’t want to talk about what had happened back then—didn’t want to think about it—so why was it that everyone else in the town seemed to want to? Why couldn’t they just let the past go and move on with their lives?

He rounded the next aisle and went to look at his list again, but something stopped him. He could hear Matt’s voice talking softly from the aisle he had just left. Apparently he hadn’t gone to check on his daughter after all. He could just barely make out what was being said.

“…surprised you didn’t know about it, though it makes sense since you didn’t move here until a couple years after it happened. It was all over the local news and the only thing anyone talked about for what felt like years after.”

“But what happened?” Lance heard the soft voice of what must have been Matt’s wife ask.

 _No,_ Lance thought. _No. Don’t talk about it. Please. Just let it go._

“Well, there was this kid named Keith,” he explained. “He was in the same grade as Lance and Katie. Real quiet kid; didn’t really say much of anything. No one knew if he was a trouble-maker or if he was just shy.”

_No. Please._

Lance wanted desperately to move, to get away from the voices, but he found that his legs wouldn’t obey him. He was rooted to the spot, forced to listen on in horror.

“It came out that one of the male teachers had been sexually assaulting the kid and had threatened to hurt him if he ever told anyone.”

_I don’t want to hear this. Please. Please, let me go._

“But then how did they find out?”

_Don’t say it._

“It was Lance. He saw them together and ran to tell the school counselor. It would’ve been fine, but I guess another student heard as Lance was explaining. A bunch of rumors started spreading—real nasty ones. They said that it had been Keith’s fault, that he had been the one to seduce the teacher. Stuff like that.”

 _Please. No more._ Lance was shaking.

“I guess it just became too much for him, and the kid ended up committing suicide. Drowned himself in the river back behind the school.”

“That’s horrible,” the wife’s voice whispered.

“Yeah, it was. Lance took it pretty badly. Blamed the kid’s death on himself, I guess. Katie said he had a complete meltdown at the school when he heard.”

_Please…_

“He stopped coming to class after that. Luckily, it was only a couple weeks until graduation. So Lance showed up, graduated, then just disappeared. None of us have heard from him in ten years. It was probably for the best, considering how much everyone in town was talking about it after it happened…”

They kept talking, but Lance couldn’t hear it anymore. His brain felt like it had shut down. At some point, he had sunken to his knees on the floor of the aisle; he was shaking too much for his legs to support his weight. He could feel tears streaming out of his eyes, and struggled to suck heavy breaths in through his aching lungs.

_Why?_

_Why did they have to talk about it?_

_Why couldn’t they have just let it die?_

_Like Keith had died._

_Like Keith had died because of Lance._

_Because Lance had killed him by telling._

_Why had he told?_

_Why had that kid listened in?_

_Why did he have to go spread those rumors afterwards?_

_Why were humans so cruel?_

_Why can’t they just let things be?_

_Why? Why? Why?_

Lance clawed at his eyes, willing for the tears, the shaking, the memories—anything—to stop. But they wouldn’t. The thoughts kept swirling around his head.

_Why? Why? Why?_

_You killed him._

_You did._

_It was your fault._

_Why?_

_Why did you do it?_

_Why? Why?_

He screamed, trying to drown out the sound of his own thoughts with the noise. It didn’t work. The ground swayed beneath him, and it became harder and harder to choke in a breath.

“No.” He groaned. “It’s not my fault. I… I didn’t mean to do it. I…”

_But if you hadn’t told, he would still be alive._

_If you hadn’t told, he would be here right now._

_Why did you tell?_

_Why—_

A hand landed on Lance’s shaking back, and he spun around, eyes flashing. He couldn’t make sense of the shadowy figure he saw through his tears. It was a monster, a grim reaper come to take him away for judgement. He screamed again and stumbled to his shaking feet, backing away from the creature.

The apparition said something, but Lance couldn’t understand. He shook his head frantically.

_No._

_Please._

_Not me, too._

_It’s not my fault._

He turned and bolted from the store, heading in no particular direction, just away from the monster. Away from Matt and his wife and his daughter and the doughnuts. Away.

After about ten minutes of running, Lance’s already-strained body gave out, and he collapsed on the ground, trying desperately to get air to his empty lungs. Night had fallen at some point, and Lance was alone in the quiet darkness.

The soft embrace of night helped to soothe Lance’s frayed nerves, and he was eventually able to calm his trembling limbs and get his racing heart back to a somewhat regular tempo. His mind was empty, and his body felt completely drained. He looked around, trying to figure out where his mad dash had taken him. He saw grass and a swing set; so, he was in the park, then.

Lance lay back down on the cool grass and gazed up at the stars, trying to steady himself. He breathed softly as, brick-by-brick, he worked to rebuild his mental wall that had been torn down by Matt’s story. He needed it to hold back the memories and the traitorous thoughts—to hold back the pain. It was the only way he had made it for this long.

In time the cold from the damp grass began to seep into Lance’s bones, and he pried himself up from the ground. He began to make his way back home with slow, weary steps. Exhaustion seemed to permeate every fiber of his being.

The walk home was a blur in his memory, a collection of step-after-weary-step rather than a singular journey. Eventually, though, Lance found himself navigating his way past the gate, through the front door, up the stairs, and into his small bedroom. He quickly changed out of his damp clothes and into his warmest pair of pajamas. He turned longingly towards the bed, but hesitated; he knew that after what he had been through earlier, there was no way he’d make it through the night without the night terrors paying him a visit if he tried to sleep, and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to bear that.

He stood there, lost, for a moment before he caught sight of a now-familiar object on his dresser: the telephone.

 _Of course,_ Lance thought. _Red. I can call Red. He always knows just what to say when I’m like this._

He reached towards the phone and found himself dialing the familiar numbers, _1166_. Red didn’t pick up until the fourth ring was almost over.

“Alright,” Lance said, trying to keep his voice casual and light. “Tell me how long it’s been so I know how much to apologize this time.”

When Red didn’t answer, Lance paused. He listened closely. He could hear faint noises from the other end of the line that almost sounded like…

“Red, are you crying?”

A shaky breath.

“Lance…” He heard Red mange through the tears. “I’m sorry, I can’t talk for long. My dad’s home. He’s asleep right now, but if he hears me talking, he might get mad. I gotta go.”

“Wait, Red,” Lance called. “Why are you crying? What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing. I’m fine.”

“Red, you have to tell me so I can help you. Was it your dad? Did he do something?”

“It’s okay, really, Lance. I—”

“Did he hurt you, Red?” Lance asked, a little too forcefully.

“No, it wasn’t—”

“Did he hurt you?” It wasn’t a question.

“Yes…” Red breathed.

“Was this the first time?”

There was a pause.

“No.”

Lance swore. He had been so blind—blind and stupid. He should have known, should have seen the signs: Reds’ father never being home, how quiet the kid was, the way he viewed himself as worthless and never let any of his classmates get close to him. It was all so obvious now that he looked back on it. He should have _seen_.

But Lance hadn’t been looking. He had been so caught up in his own troubles that he hadn’t given Red the attention that he deserved, that he so desperately needed. How many years had he put up with it? How many years now had he comforted Lance while bearing his own private demons in silence?

“Please don’t think badly of him, Lance. It wasn’t his fault. It’s just… Ever since mom died, he started drinking… He just can’t control himself sometimes. He really doesn’t mean to hurt me…”

“Red, you can’t justify this. It doesn’t matter how sad he is, no father should ever hit his child. It’s abuse. Do you understand?”

“Yeah…”

“Good. Does anyone else know about it? What about Nanny?”

“Of course not,” there was a small choking sound as Red barked a laugh through his sobs. The sound would’ve brought tears to Lance’s own eyes if he hadn’t been so angry. “If she knew, there would be no way she’d let me stay here.”

“Red, you know you can’t stay with him like this.”

“I know,” Red said quietly. He took a deep breath to calm his tears before continuing. “But it’s fine. Dad’s leaving for a business trip again in the morning. He’ll be gone for three months. Then as soon as the summer’s over, I’ll be starting high school, and I can move into the dorms.”

“Red…”

“I’ll be fine, Lance. I know how to take care of myself. You don’t have to worry about me.”

Lance didn’t want to leave it at that; he wished there was something he could do to help Red, but he wasn’t sure how. His only contact with the boy was through whatever it was that linked their two phones, so he couldn’t exactly go there in person and help him…

“If there’s anything I can do to help—anything at all—please tell me. You don’t have to go through this on your own.”

“Thank you,” Red breathed. “Thank you so much, Lance. But you don’t have to do anything more than you’re already doing. Just talking to you is enough. You were willing to be my friend when nobody else was, and that means the world to me. Just… Just promise that you won’t stop calling me, okay?”

“You don’t have to worry about that. I would miss your stories about the adventures of Cat Lance too much. Nope, I’m afraid you’re stuck with me, Red.”

The two shared a small chuckle, and a comfortable silence fell over them. Neither of them thought about the misfortunes that awaited them just outside the little bubble of peace they had created for themselves, content just to enjoy the sound of their breaths mingling over the phone speakers.

Eventually, the silence was broken by Red’s voice.

“You know… You don’t have to keep calling me Red,” the boy said hesitantly, almost nervously.

“What do you mean?”

“I just meant….  You can call me by my real name, if you want…”

“Your real name?” Lance asked, taken aback for a moment. “I thought Red was your real name.”

Red let out a soft laugh. “Of course not! No one is actually named Red. It’s just my nickname. Or, well, it was. It’s what everyone used to call me when I was a kid, but I haven’t gone by Red since sixth grade. Now it’s only you and Nanny who call me that.”

“Alright, Red,” Lance replied, curious. “What should I call you, then?”

“You can call me Keith.”

 _Keith_.

 _That name… No. There’s no way. No way that Keith—_ Lance’s Keith _—could be…_

“Lance?” Keith asked. Lance had been silent for too long, lost in the thoughts that were whirling around in his head like a blizzard. “Are you still there?”

“Yeah,” he answered softly, “I’m still here…”

“I’m sorry. You don’t have to call me Keith if you don’t want. Red's fine, too. I just thought…” He trailed off.

“No, no. It’s okay,” Lance responded quickly. “Keith’s a great name. It’s just… I used to know someone named Keith, so it threw me off a little was all.”

“Oh.” Was all he got in reply.

“Look, Red… Uh, sorry, Keith,” Lance started hesitantly. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Of course,” said the other boy. “Always.”

“I know this might seem like a strange question, but can you tell me the name of your school?”

“Oh, yeah. I guess I never really told you what school I go to, huh? What are you planning to do, old man? You gonna stalk me?” The boy laughed.

Lance didn’t respond, and Keith’s laugh faded.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “I trust you. I know you’re not gonna do anything creepy. Can I ask why, or…?”

“I…” Lance trailed off.

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it. You don’t have to tell me why if you don’t want to. If it’s you, I know there’s got to be a good reason for it. Just… Maybe you can tell me when you’re ready?”

“Okay.” Lance promised. “When I’m ready.”

Hopefully, there really wasn’t any reason for Lance to know. Hopefully he was being paranoid, and Red just happened to be someone named Keith—someone named Keith who just happened to be the same age as Lance and live in the same area... It didn’t necessarily mean—

“After summer, I’ll be starting at Garrison.”

Garrison Academy. The school that Lance had gone to.

Of course.

Of course Red had to be _that_ Keith.

Of course the one person Lance had been able to get close to in the last ten years had to be the one that had caused him to hole himself off from the world in the first place.

Of course the universe couldn’t give him a _fucking_ break.

Without really meaning to, Lance started to laugh. It was a desperate, half-crazed sound that came from the torn pit of his being which had been corrupted with pain and sorrow almost beyond recognition, that part of himself that he hid behind his wall and tried his best to cover up and hide from the world.

“Lance?” Keith asked, concerned. “What’s—”

“You go to Garrison, huh?” Lance cut him off. “Let me guess, the year is, what, 2005? 2006? Which means that you’re set to graduate in 2008. Isn’t that right, _Keith_?”

“Yes, but, Lance… I don’t understand. Why—?”

“No. Of course you don’t. You’re just a fucking child. How could you understand? How could you understand any of this?”

Lance was shouting, and he didn’t know why.  He knew he shouldn’t be yelling, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself. There was a small part of himself—growing larger every second—that just wanted to scream, to tear down his wall and let loose all those terrible emotions he had been bundling up inside for the last ten years.

“Well, guess what? I _finally_ understand. I finally get it. Everything. It all makes sense now.”

“Lance…” Keith’s voice was just a whisper.

“Don’t you see? It’s a joke! This thing between us—my whole life—it’s all one big fucking joke that whoever runs this hellhole of a universe is playing on me! Isn’t it funny, Keith? Isn’t it fucking hilarious?”

Keith didn’t reply, but Lance barely even noticed; he was lost to the yelling, to the laughter and the pain.

“Let’s all laugh at Lance. Let’s all smile and point as we give him a spark of hope that maybe things aren’t so bad after all—that maybe his life could have some small chance to get better—before we snuff it out and throw it in his face!” There were tears on his cheeks, but he couldn’t tell if they were from the laughter or from something else. “Well, HA HA. Can’t you see me laughing? Maybe I should just kill myself, too. Wouldn’t that just be the icing on the—”

Lance stopped abruptly as the meaning of what he’d just said caught up with him. He heard harsh breathing and the muffled sound of sobs from the receiver.

_Keith._

“Oh my god. Red! I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean—”

“No. Don’t worry,” Keith forced through his tears. “I get it. I really do. You know, that’s the same thing my dad always says, ‘I didn’t mean it’.”

He paused, then spat out, “I thought you were different, but you’re just like him. Don’t worry, I won’t force you to talk to me again, so don’t bother calling.”

There was a click as Keith hung up the phone, and Lance was left with nothing but the buzz of the dial tone in his ear.

What had he just done?

A sudden realization dawned on him: Keith was still alive. He hated Lance’s guts now, sure, but, somewhere, he was still alive. If Lance could convince him to just stay away from Mr. Sendak, then none of the event from Senior year would have happened, and Keith would never kill himself.

He knew that there was no way Keith ever would listen to him again, but he owed it to the kid to try.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no excuses.


	8. Chapter 8

Keith knew who Lance was, of course. He had known for a while now, ever since that call back in 2004. The second Lance had told him that they were the same age—that their calls were traveling through time—he had been sure.

They had been in the same school since fourth grade. And, though they never seemed to end up in the same class, Keith knew the other boy like the back of his hand. They had first met in fifth grade when the two had been placed in the same reading group, and Keith had taken notice of him right away. At first, he thought it had been just because the boy shared the same name as  _ his _ Lance, the only friend he’d ever really had, but over time he came to realize it was more than just that.

The boy was kind, almost unbelievably so. He was always smiling, always ready to lend a helping hand to any of their classmates. Even though it was well known throughout their school that Lance’s family was far from wealthy, Keith had noticed him sharing his meager allowance of lunch money with other kids if they ever forgot their own at home. He was always willing to put his own comfort aside for the sake of others. In a way, the boy reminded Keith of his old nanny, Allura.

It happened in 2003. Keith had been walking through the hallway of the school, eyes down to avoid any attention, trying to get to his classroom as quickly as possible—just a normal day. He wasn’t sure who stuck their foot out, but from one second to the next, he was sent sprawling; the contents of his backpack scattered across the floor. There had been laughter and congratulation as whoever the culprit had been raced back to their friends. Keith hadn’t looked back; he had just kept his eyes on the ground from his new position on the floor. He didn’t care who the perpetrator was. At this point, every bully was just a faceless villain, a villain he knew would never be caught. But that was just the nature of things. The strong ruled, and the weak—like Keith—had to just follow along on their own. That was the way of the world.

Slowly, Keith began to reach for his fallen items; he would gather them up and continue on his way, just like he’d always done. But this time was different. This time there was a pair of beat-up Converse that appeared in Keith’s vision as his fingers wrapped around one of his books, a hand that reached out for Keith’s own to help him up, and a warm smile flecked with the silver of braces that belonged to—

_ Lance _ .

Their eyes met as soon as he was back on his feet, and Keith felt his face immediately begin to burn red. He became very conscious of their clasped hands.

This wasn’t what was supposed to happen. They were never supposed to meet, never supposed to talk or make eye contact. Or touch. That wasn’t how things worked in the world— in Keith’s world. In the world of shadows.

Lance came from a different world than Keith. He belonged in the sunshine and the light, surrounded by friends and family that loved him. Their worlds should never have crossed. Keith had been content just to watch from afar, to let the boy’s light warm him from a distance.

But Lance had offered his hand, had helped him up and given him a smile. Keith felt like he would almost melt under the warmth that radiated off the other boy. Just for a moment, Keith felt his shadows being chased away, and he could imagine what his life would have been like if he belonged to the world Lance lived in: If he had friends. If he had a family that supported him, that loved him.

Lance grabbed Keith’s books off the floor and offered them to him, saying, “Are you okay? That looked like a pretty bad fall; he should have at least said sorry. Do you need me to take you to the nurse’s office?”

Keith could only take the books and silently shake his head, rendered speechless by the brightness of the boy’s smile.

“Okay, then, if you’re sure. Try to be more careful next time, okay? The halls are pretty crowded, so it’s easy to trip.”

With that, Lance had turned and bounded back to his group of waiting friends, leaving Keith alone to stare after him. When the boy had left, he had taken his brightness with him, and Keith found that he was once again able to breath. But now his breathing felt empty and hollow without that warm presence. He stared after Lance’s figure as it retreated down the hall, laughing and talking to its friends, spreading its light elsewhere, away from Keith.

“Thank you,” Keith had whispered after him. He knew that Lance wouldn’t be able to hear him, but that was alright. A person like Keith didn’t deserve to speak to someone as bright as Lance.

But, if nothing else, one thing had been made clear by the encounter: Keith was hopelessly, madly, and without any doubt—in love Lance.

Which was why, when he found out that the Lance who had been his distant and only companion through the phone for most of his childhood was the same Lance who had offered his hand to Keith in the hall that day, and that neither remembered him… of course he was going to play along when Lance said they hadn’t gone to the same school.

There was no way Keith would’ve been able to tell him how that simple sentence had managed to smash his heart into a hundred thousand pieces. This was Lance, after all. Keith had to be brave, had to show Lance only the good parts of himself so he wouldn’t make him sad. Lance deserved to be happy, even if that meant that Keith had to break his own heart to do it; it was worth it just to hear his laugh.

So Keith closed himself off. He would laugh and joke with Lance on the phone, but he made a promise to himself that he would never hope for anything beyond that. He was just a boy that Lance would call to talk to every so often; he didn’t deserve to be anything more than that. In the end, Lance didn’t even remember Keith’s name.

Though he tried to laugh it off, it had been hard to continue the call after that, and Keith had ended it as soon as he could, citing homework as his excuse. He just wanted a moment—one single minute—to grieve his heartbreak in silence, and then he’d be over the boy for good. Or, so he told himself. But it wasn’t that easy.

He still saw the boy everywhere, was hyper-aware of his presence every time he was near. With every smile or casual joke Keith saw him exchange with his friends, he could feel himself falling deeper. Pretty soon, he was in so deep it felt he might drown in the feeling. It terrified him.

Months passed without another call from Lance.

A year.

Still no call.

Keith had used to wait for Lance’s calls with nothing but a childish anticipation at the thought of getting to speak to his friend. Now, however, the prospect of receiving a call filled him with a perverse mixture of excitement and dread. He jumped at the ring of every phone he heard. He started to wonder—as he often had when he was a kid—if Lance would ever call him back or if whatever it was that magically linked their two phones had stopped working. What if he never heard the voice of his friend again?

And so it was that, when Keith’s father returned home early from his business trip that night, Keith found himself sitting silently at the dinner table, lost in his own thoughts. He wasn’t sure exactly what had prompted it—maybe if there hadn’t really been any cause at all — but from one second to the next, Keith found his plate flying from the table to crash on the floor.

His dad was yelling something, he could tell, but he couldn’t focus on what. All his instincts were driving him to get away, to flee the shouting monster before him, but he stayed put and stared blankly ahead. He knew it would anger the beast even more if he tried to run away.

Keith felt pain as he was grabbed roughly by the arm and dragged to his room. His dad pushed him inside, shouted something unintelligible, and slammed the door. He listened for footsteps outside his door, and only after they had disappeared down the stairs did he finally allow the tears to fall. He sat shaking and hugging his knees to his chest in front of his door until he heard the crashes from downstairs stop. They were soon replaced by the dull drone of the television set and an occasional raspy cough. He knew that once the TV was on, his dad would be asleep soon after.

Much later, Keith finally uncurled himself from in front of the door and inspected the sore spot on his arm; it was definitely going to leave a bruise. He’d have to wear long sleeves for the next week or so, despite the summer heat. But at least the bruise wasn’t somewhere visible this time …

He choked back a sob and roughly wiped the tears from his face, but they were quickly replaced with new ones.

_ Why am I crying?  _  he thought.  _ I should be used to his by now. I should be able to take care of myself. _

He looked hopelessly around the room, trying to find something—anything—to distract himself so he could stop the tears. His eyes landed on his sketchbook, his treasured possession, but even that wouldn’t do any good for him now. Aside from a few portraits and a couple landscape practices, Keith had barely been able to touch it since his last phone call with Lance. It reminded him too much of the other boy.

_ Lance… _

He sighed.

_ I want to talk to him. _

Keith wished now as he had so many times before that his connection with the boy was two-way. Lance had explained to him during one of their conversations the way that he was able to call Keith without knowing his phone number—by dialing 1166—and, of course, Keith had tried it. Several times. However, every call was met with an automated message telling him the number was no longer in service. He had never told Lance about these failed attempts, and Lance had never thought to ask. Eventually, he had stopped trying, but that didn’t lessen his desire to talk to the other boy at all.

Despite how much he wanted to speak to Lance, however, he knew he wouldn’t call the boy, even if he had been able to. Even though he might be able to provide some comfort, there was no way Keith would want Lance to hear him in the state he was in. No, Lance deserved better than that. When he called, Keith wanted to be able to put on his brave face, to greet him with a smile and a laugh the way he always did. He wasn’t sure why, but he felt like if he was able to convince Lance that he was a good, kind, happy person—if he had at least one person out there who believed that he belonged somewhere other than his world of shadow—then it would make everything he had to go through bearable. He wasn’t sure what he would do if Lance knew the truth, knew how selfish and broken he really was…

A piercing ring emanated from the white phone on his nightstand. Keith jumped.

_ No. _ he thought. _ No. Why now?  Why does he have to call now of all times? _

It rang again.

_ I can’t answer. Dad’s finally asleep. The talking might wake him up. _

The phone rang for a third time.

Keith thought about how it had been a year since Lance’s last call, about how it could be even longer until the next one if he didn’t answer now.

It began to ring for a fourth time, and Keith knew that there was no way he’d be able to resist answering. It was Lance, after all. What if he needed Keith? What if he’d had a nightmare again and needed to be comforted?

It didn’t help that Keith’s entire body was longing to hear the sound of other boy’s voice.

He took a deep breath to steady himself, and picked up the phone. He could do this. He could be strong for Lance. There was no reason the other boy even needed to know that he’d been crying. It would be fine.

It was not fine.

The second he heard Lance’s voice, the tears began to flow again.

Lance saw through him in less than a second, and was comforting Keith in just as long. Of course Lance hadn’t abandoned him after learning the truth. Of course he hadn’t shrunk back in disgust. Of course. It was  _ Lance _ , the kindest person Keith had ever met. The man he was in love with. Why had he ever thought that Lance would reject him?

Keith was struck by the urge to tell him everything, to open up about all his dark secrets. He wanted Lance to know him. Wanted Lance to  _ remember  _ him.

“You can call me Keith.”

The words were out of his mouth before he’d even had a chance to think about what he was saying. His revelation did not have the effect he had intended. Instead of a heartfelt reunion, he had gotten… laughter, if it could even be called that. It was a harsh, broken sound. It didn’t sound like his Lance at all—more like some hunted, wounded animal.

Lance began to yell, but Keith couldn’t seem to take in what he was saying. His body grew stiff, and he automatically flinched, waiting for the impending blow even as none came. Suddenly Lance wasn’t himself anymore. He had been transformed into a beast, just as his father had whenever he drank too much.

The one person that he knew he could trust in the whole world had become just another enemy.

The tears that had dried up during their conversation began to flow again.

At some point, Lance stopped shouting and tried to apologize, but it was too late. Keith had seen the beast that lay dormant inside of him, the same beast that lived inside his father.

“You’re just like him.” Keith’s mouth moved automatically.

_ No. He’s not. That’s not possible. He’s Lance, not Dad. He’s not a monster, not really. There’s no way they’re the same. This must be my fault somehow; I must have made him angry. I shouldn’t have told him who I was. _

“Don’t bother calling again.”

_ Why did I say that? It’s not his fault. It’s me. It’s all me. _

He hung up the phone.

_ Why? Why did I do that? _

His hands shook.

_ Why was Lance shouting? What did I say to make him so angry? _

He struggled suck a breath in through the tears he was trying to hold back.

_ Lance would never do something like that. Not  _ my _ Lance. _

He remembered his father sleeping downstairs.

He had to be quiet. He couldn’t wake his dad up, couldn’t risk making a noise.

_ Lance…. _

A sob escaped from his lips despite his attempts to suppress it.

_ What have I done? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> POV swap!!! (☉o☉)


	9. Chapter 9

Lance called again five times in the next year and a half. Keith didn’t answer any of the calls. He had been tempted to, and had almost given in more than once, but he knew that it was better for both of them if he didn’t answer. Even though each time he sat listening to the ringing phone without picking up pained him more than he could possibly say.

He knew that what had happened with Lance had been his own fault, so he resolved himself to never speak to the other boy again. If he did, he might hurt Lance again, might cause the beast inside to rear up again. He wouldn’t be able to bear it if Lance became tainted and broken like he was.

His resolve lasted up until the sixth call; he made it through the first four rings, but his hand seemed to move on its own and grabbed the handset before it reached the fifth. He heard the small click as the handset was lifted off the reciever, and knew there was no turning back. He hesitantly lifted it up to his ear.

“Hello….?” He asked softly.

“Red? Thank god. You finally answered… I’m not too late.” Lance sounded like he’d been crying. He took a breath to steady his shaking voice. “Look, kid, I know you must hate me right now, but you’ve got to listen to me. Please. Just listen to me this one time, then you never have to talk to me ever again, okay?”

Keith was silent.

Didn’t Lance know that Keith already forgave him? It hadn’t been Lance’s fault at all. It had been Keith’s. How could he possibly hate Lance?

“Okay…” Lance continue hesitantly after a moment with no response. “I know it’ll sound strange, but I’m just going to come right out and say it. Keith, if Mr. Sendak ever asks you to go with him to his office alone, you have to say no. Do you understand? I know it doesn’t make any sense, but—”

Keith let out a short laugh. Noble Lance, always trying to help. He didn’t realize that Keith deserved everything that happened. There was no use trying to save a boy like Keith, a boy who belonged in the world of shadows. No amount of light could drive away the darkness that surrounded him.

“You’re too late,” he said. “About four months too late. You’re trying to warn me about that asshole, right? I guess it’s my own fault for not answering your calls.”

“What?” Lance breathed. “I’m too late? No… There’s no way.”

“Afraid so. But how did you know to warn me? I know  _ I _ didn’t tell you. That bastard would’ve made good on his promise to tear me to pieces if I had. So how did you find out?”

“I… I can’t tell you. I’m sorry.” Lance’s voice was a mere whisper.

“It’s fine. I really don’t care at this point. Anyways, you delivered your message, so—”

“Wait!” Lance called with renewed energy. “Please don’t hang up! You have to listen to me.”

“What are you talking about? It’s already happened. There’s nothing you can do to change that, so why are you still trying?”

“No, it hasn’t. I may have been too late to save you from this pain, but there’s something coming that’s so much worse. We can stop it, but only if you listen to me. Keith, you need to tell someone about what’s happening.”

“What?”

“You need to tell someone—the counselors, the police, anyone—that he’s harassing you.”

“You don’t understand. He threatened to kill me if I ever even thought about telling anyone. And I know him, that’s a promise that he’ll deffinitely hold up.”

“Not if he’s in jail.” Lance’s voice was almost pleading. “Keith, please. I promise, he won’t hurt you. But you have to tell someone.”

“I…”

“Please. You have to promise me.”

Terror was building up inside Keith’s mind at even the suggestion of breaking the pact of fear that Mr. Sendak had forced him under. But this was Lance, and he would never do anything to hurt him.

Keith took a deep breath.

“Okay,” he said quietly. “I promise.”

“Good.” Lance breathed out a sigh of relief. “Promise me one more thing, okay?”

“What is it?”

“After all this is over, come find me. I know it’ll be awhile for you to wait, but I want you to meet me at the schoolhouse on Janurary 1, 2018 at 5 pm. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“See you then, kiddo.”

“Yeah. See you, Lance.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're almost done, you guys! It's been a ride, but there's only one more chapter!!!


	10. Chapter 10

Keith finished scrubbing the last of the mugs and wiped his hands off on his uniform’s apron. He called out to his boss that he was leaving and clocked out on the old computer in the back of the bakery. A co-worker waved him off, and he nodded in return.

He walked around the counter to the sitting area, where a few regulars sat musing over their coffee. In the corner of the shop, a small television was showing a rerun of a local news segment that had been broadcasted earlier in the day. Keith had already seen the segment, but he paused on his way out to watch it anyways.

The screen showed a pretty blond woman in a blouse interviewing a man of about the same age as Keith, wearing a casual suit and looking way too successful to be anywhere near the small New England town. The caption underneath read: “Lance Fletcher, local author of the New York Times bestselling book, _A Sketch in Time_.” The interview was to promote a book signing that the author was going to have at the town’s library later that day.

He had published the book earlier in the year, and it had already won several awards. The story of the book was set in the author’s hometown—the town next to where Keith was now living—and it had gained the small town a lot of tourism and press coverage in the last couple months. The locals hardly knew what to do with their new-found fame.

In the interview, the author was just finishing an explanation of how the idea for the story had come from a reoccuring dream he’d been having for years. Keith had already known that particular fact; the author said much the same thing in every interview he gave, and Keith had seen them all. The blond woman began to give the details of where the book signing was to be held, but Keith turned away from the screen. He already knew the details. He had clocked off work early specifically so he could go to the signing, after all.

There was no way he would miss a chance to talk to Lance… Even if Lance didn’t remember him. Even if Lance had no idea who he was.

After that last call, Lance had never called again, though Keith had waited for years before finally giving up hope.

The Lance in his own time had moved away shortly after graduation to go to some out-of-state university, and Keith had remained behind. He had found an apartment and started working at a bakery in a nearby city. When Allura learned what happened with his father and Mr. Sendak, she convinced him to start seeing a psychiatrist, so he did.

He liked his psychiatrist, an inviting man named Takashi. He felt like he was finally able to open up about all the things that had happened to him. The only thing he never mentioned was that kind man who had become his friend quite by accident all those years ago. That was one secret that he would prefer to keep to himself, locked up inside his heart where it could warm him on his darkest days. He could feel the sessions working, though, and he began to get better. Little-by-little, he noticed his inner shadows shrinking away as his own light began to emerge. For the first time in a long time, he felt like he could actually be happy instead of just hiding under the mask of a smile for the sake of others.

Though he still longed more than anything to talk to Lance again, he found that he was able to wait patiently. He knew, if nothing else, that he would be able to see Lance again on the date they had promised to meet: January 1, 2018 at the schoolhouse. He could bear the waiting, as long as he knew he’d be able to hear Lance’s voice again. So he waited.

Weeks went by.

Then months.

Then years.

But when the day finally, _finally_ came, Lance hadn’t been there. The school had been empty and deserted, all the students away on their winter break, and Keith had been forced to face the fact that Lance had forgotten all about him.

That was around the time that Lance published his first book.

Of course, Keith had read it as soon as he heard. There was no way he could have resisted; reading the book was almost like having a little piece of Lance with him again.

As Lance published more and more books, he began to gain recognition for his works, and he was no longer just some nobody author from a little town in the middle of nowhere. Keith watched each and every interview he was featured in, read every book with the hunger of a starving man. They almost seemed to fill the gaping hole in his life that had been left by the absence of the other boy.

When _A Sketch of the Past_ was published, Keith had known the instant he began reading it: the book was about him. Them. Their story. Lance said in the interviews that the story came from a dream, so that must mean that somewhere, deep down, he remembered. He had to. Keith didn’t think he would be able to bear it if he didn’t.

He knew that this interview would be it, would be his last chance to talk to the boy who had changed his life, even if it was as nothing more than a fan.

When Keith finally made it to the bookstore, he was faced with a long line of dozens—if not hundreds—of excited fans. He stood in line with the others and awaited his turn. Finally, after an hour and a half of waiting, Keith found himself standing at the front of the line with nothing between himself and Lance but a tabled covered in copies of the same book.

At that moment, he realized something. It didn’t matter whether Lance recognized him or not. Even if the boy didn’t remember him, Keith would always, always remember Lance. He knew that a part of his friend would always live on inside him, the part of himself that Lance had been able to change with his light. And he knew that, somewhere, he had left a small part of himself in Lance, too. Even if the boy would never realize it or know who had left it there. Keith was content in the knowledge that what had happened between them had been real—for Keith, at least—and there was nothing that could change that.

He walked up to the table and looked down at the author, at the charming smile that was plastered over the too-familiar face. This wasn’t his Lance. He knew that now. His Lance only existed as a memory, deep within Keith’s heart. The smiling face before him was only a reflection of the man that had shaped his life.

He took a deep breath and let it out again, then handed the man his copy of the book.

“Who do you want me to sign it to?” The author asked, barely glancing up at Keith as he spoke. He had already been at the signing for hours, and, to him, Keith’s was just one in a sea of faces.

“Either Red or Keith,” he replied. “Whichever you prefer.”

The man’s smile faded, and he looked up again, this time really looking at Keith’s face.

“What did you say?”

“My name. It’s Keith.”

“I see,” the author replied, and quickly wrote an inscription in the book.

“You know,” he continued, handing the book back to Keith, “you share a name with an early draft version of Jonathan. I had originally written him to be named Keith before my editor encouraged me to change it. It’s a good name.”

“Yes, I think so.”

“Well, Keith,” the man said in a manner that obviously indicated that Keith’s time was up and he should move on so the next person in line could have their turn. The charming smile was back up. “I wish you all the luck in your future. Thank you for enjoying my books. I don’t know where I’d be without my fans.”

“No,” Keith replied, looking past the man’s smile into his eyes. “Thank _you_. You’ve changed the lives of so many people in more ways than you could ever know. I just want to make sure you know that. So, thank you. Thank you so much… Lance.”

And for a second, Keith thought he saw a flash of recognition in the author’s eyes, some image of the boy he had used to know. But, no. It was just the lighting.

He turned and weaved his way through the sea of jostling elbows towards the door as the next fan made her way up to the table, his heart sinking with every step.

_He doesn’t remember me, not even a little._

_My Lance is gone. Now he only exists in my memories._

_That’s okay, though. Even just the memory of Lance is more than enough._

He finally made it through the crowd and was almost out the door when—

“Wait!” A voice called. Instantly, a hush fell over the room.

Keith turned back towards the voice to see the author stumbling through the crowd, out of breath and with tears freely running down his face.

“Wait…” He breathed, as he reached Keith. He hunched for a second, trying to catch his breath from his dash to catch the other boy. Finally, he straightened back up and looked Keith in the eyes.

“I didn’t think it was possible, but… You’re really him, aren’t you, the boy from my dreams? You’re Red?”

Keith didn’t know what to do besides nod a simple yes.

Lance smiled at the other boy and reached out his hand to lightly touch Keith’s face, almost to reassure himself that Keith was really there, that it wasn’t a dream.

“Finally,” he whispered. “I’ve finally found you.”

Keith shook his head. “I’ve been right here, waiting. You didn’t need to find me.” He smiled. “Lance, you’ve finally found yourself.”

“Yeah,” Lance said, a smile forming on his own face despite the tears. “I guess I have.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaaand.... That's all, folks! We're done! Thanks to all of you who stuck with me and read the whole thing! Please let me know what you think in the comments--I promise I'll read every single one of them. Probably multiple times. Might print them out and frame them or something. Maybe tattoo them on my face? We'll never know unless you post them, right? So do it! Please! And thank you so much again for taking the time to read this smoking pile of hot garbage! You guys are the best!!!
> 
> Fun fact: I originally wrote this piece for a final project in one of my English 300 courses. I has based the characters off Keith and Lance, but changed the names when I turned it in. So when Lance says that the character "Jonathan" was based off Keith, he really means it! But the name Jonathan worked a lot better in the story (I.e. it actually has nicknames that make sense, rather than just "Red"...)


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